§ 2.36 p.m.
§ LORD FOLEYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware that many retired and elderly people who live in flats on fixed incomes are being called upon to pay unreasonably high increases in charges for services and administration which they are incapable of challenging as individual tenants because of their inability to afford the legal costs involved; and since estate agents and their principals refuse, in the main, to recognise associations of tenants, whether they will introduce 99 legislation to make such recognition compulsory in circumstances where over 70 per cent of tenants form such associations in block of 20 or more flats.]
§ LORD KENNETMy Lords, as I explained in answer to the noble Lord's Question yesterday, tenants of flats subject to rent regulation may ask the rent officer to determine a fair rent, in which service and management costs will be taken into account. The Rent Act 1965, which established this system, enables either party to an application for a fair rent to be represented by any person they wish, so that a tenant may be represented by an officer or agent of a tenant's association, whether or not that association is recognised by his landlord. It does not therefore seem necessary to legislate on the basis suggested by the noble Lord.